I have had the XL4 for 5 days now. I like the new interface and the four tuners.
I previously had a series 3, which has been moved to the bedroom. I miss it in my main tv room.
My question is, is the series 3 the best TiVo ever? I love the program titles (and the time) on the front display. It was really a good device, especially given when it was released.
What do you guys think?

It (inclusive of the very similar HD) was the last Tivo. In the original sense of the Tivo as an open useful platform. I would guess that the series 3 marked the end of any involvement of any of the original Tivo principals or talent.

Well I have an original Series 3, TiVo HD, & Premiere. If you only rate them on being a "DVR" they are all great. If you are a person who worries about how the UI looks instead of how it works or a person that wants something more than a DVR then things change and become much more personal. From an OTA user point of view the Series 3 units work slightly better for me. For me personally being able to self upgrade the internal hard drive to 2TB for the TiVo HD & Premiere are a plus for both of those units.

I doubt someone on a cable system going to MPEG 4 with expensive cable cards thinks an original Series 3 unit which can not receive the MPEG 4 channels and needs 2 cable cards is better than a Premiere.

So I guess my opinion on which is "best" comes down to how the individual is using/rating them.

The S3 was the last Tivo I owned so I can't compare it to the Premiere or anything newer than the Tivo HD. The HD was a budget version of the S3 with most of the same technology but not all of the features. The best thing I liked about the S3 was the display that would indicate what shows were currently being recorded. No other Tivo I've seen has ever had this feature. I thought it was overpriced, but since it was the first digital cablecard DVR it's what you had to pay for new technology.

I think the S2 was my favorite TiVo. Probably because it was my first and the dramatic effect it had on my tv watching habit. Everything since then has been a slow incremental upgrade. Folks with S1's probably think the same about that device.

I still use an s3 daily and it performs as a DVR very well. Beyond that, not so much.

I liked my 3 THD's, but sold 2 of them and now have a THD and a P4 and an XL4. The thing I like about the Premieres are the 4 tuners, but the best improvement is Streaming vs. copying! This means that we can watch any show from 1 Premiere on another and not care about the copy bits, or waiting for a show to start to transfer!

I liked my 3 THD's, but sold 2 of them and now have a THD and a P4 and an XL4. The thing I like about the Premieres are the 4 tuners, but the best improvement is Streaming vs. copying! This means that we can watch any show from 1 Premiere on another and not care about the copy bits, or waiting for a show to start to transfer!

Is it really *any* show?

I don't have 2 Premieres, but I was unable to stream some downloaded *podcasts* on my iPad mini (but I could stream HBO shows which are clearly copy protected). BTW, this was just playing with it (though IIRC, they were old enough podcasts that I *couldn't* just re-download them on the iPad).

It didn't give me a copy protected error, it just gave whatever error it gives when it can't start a stream.. and other things were able to stream.

Well I have an original Series 3, TiVo HD, & Premiere. If you only rate them on being a "DVR" they are all great. If you are a person who worries about how the UI looks instead of how it works or a person that wants something more than a DVR then things change and become much more personal. From an OTA user point of view the Series 3 units work slightly better for me. For me personally being able to self upgrade the internal hard drive to 2TB for the TiVo HD & Premiere are a plus for both of those units.

I doubt someone on a cable system going to MPEG 4 with expensive cable cards thinks an original Series 3 unit which can not receive the MPEG 4 channels and needs 2 cable cards is better than a Premiere.

So I guess my opinion on which is "best" comes down to how the individual is using/rating them.

You can put a 2TB drive in that OLED S3 using only WinMFS as long as that 648 is already running version 11.0k of the TiVo software, which it almost certainly is.

The S3 was the last Tivo I owned so I can't compare it to the Premiere or anything newer than the Tivo HD. The HD was a budget version of the S3 with most of the same technology but not all of the features. The best thing I liked about the S3 was the display that would indicate what shows were currently being recorded. No other Tivo I've seen has ever had this feature. I thought it was overpriced, but since it was the first digital cablecard DVR it's what you had to pay for new technology.

I never found the display that useful. At a standard distance I couldn't read it anyway. The clock was OK, since it was bigger, but the actual show names were so small you basically had to walk up to it to see them.

I think visually the Premiere is a better looking box. Although the speed of the UI leaves a lot to be desired.

From what I've heard through the grapevine the upcoming 6 tuner unit is going to be pretty swank, so it might just turn out to be the best TiVo ever made. But I'll reserve judgement until I actually get my hands on one.

How many of you who are happy with your Tivo (any model) are forced to use a Tuning Adapter? I bet if you separated satisfaction statistics based on that factor you would find much less average satisfaction among those forced to use TA's. (Of course there will never be any satisfaction statistics.)

I have so many TA-related problems with my Tivo HD that I just can't get excited about spending money to upgrade to a newer model -- just to have the same issues again -- or maybe even worse if more tuners are involved.

Time Warner's anti-Tivo strategy (whether intentional or incidental) is working.

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You can actually do all sorts of stuff remotely via the Premiere units now. If you select the More Options or Explore This Show via the remote interface you can setup future recordings, add/adjust a SP and a few other things. And from the iPad app you can do even more like manage the To Do List or SP Manager. It's a LOT easier then having to run into the other room and turn on the TV just do anything.

I never found the display that useful. At a standard distance I couldn't read it anyway. The clock was OK, since it was bigger, but the actual show names were so small you basically had to walk up to it to see them.

I missed the OLED so much that I wrote a script to put the current recordings up on a digital photo frame. Most of the time you know what should be recording and you can tell from a distance if that's what's on the display even if you might not have been able to read it without knowing.

I redid the living room and put all the video components in a nearby closet. So I can't even see the unit anyways so the OLED would not have value anyways. The digital picture frame is an interesting idea though. One could add all sorts of stuff however with the Tivo App on my iPad I can pretty much mimic that.

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How many of you who are happy with your Tivo (any model) are forced to use a Tuning Adapter?

I was never forced to use a TA, but I happily did so as long as I was a customer of TW Cable. I left TWC because of their utterly horrid customer service, and while I am mostly happy with the new Cable Company, I dearly wish they employed SDV and Tuning Adapters. The somewhat lower monthly cable bill is nice, but it nowhere nearly makes up for all the channels I can no longer receive because the provider simply does not have the bandwidth. Not only that, but since this CATV company is experiencing some weird problem that causes S3 TiVos to lose channels 800 - 824 most eveninings, I am missing a lot more channels than I ever did with a TA. Fortunately, those channels are mostly the national networks (ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, etc.), so I really don't care whether they are available, or not.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dlfl

I bet if you separated satisfaction statistics based on that factor you would find much less average satisfaction among those forced to use TA's. (Of course there will never be any satisfaction statistics.)

I bet not. What's more, I'mm willing to bet a modest amount many of those grumbling about TA would scream, "Bloody murder!", if they had them taken away and lost nearly half their HD channels or more.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dlfl

I have so many TA-related problems with my Tivo HD that I just can't get excited about spending money to upgrade to a newer model -- just to have the same issues again -- or maybe even worse if more tuners are involved.

I'm certainly not going to upgrade to a newer model, but the fact has nothing to do with the TA. The S4 and its virtually certain successors are just too patheric.

I never found the display that useful. At a standard distance I couldn't read it anyway.

Me, either. What's more, in the theater, the TiVo sits behind the viewers, not in front of them, and isn't visibe at all to people in the front row, unless they stand up. In the living room, the view for most people is obscured by a coffee table. It was never anything I found of particular value, especially since I really could not care less what is currently recording.